To find this H comment annoying

I too it ford many, many, MANY red flags @Ginge88 and I am an otherwise intelligent and assertive woman with a great career and to all outward intents and purposes a very strident feminist. Which puts the shit I put up with at home even more mind boggling and embarrassing. We got together when I was very young (just turned 20) and I had terrible role modelling from my parents in terms of their relationship dynamics and inability to set healthy boundaries.

In terms of the recordings - my exH knew I had them as the reason I took them was not to punish jom
or as revenge or anything but because 🥴 I thought if he saw evidence of his behaviour after he had calmed down he would realise how bad he was and stop it/take steps to address it. What a moron. I now realise he knew exactly what he was doing and didn’t give a shit/thought I’d never leave.

Given you are scared of his reaction if he found out about the recordings, he’s clearly psychologically abusive. I’d highly recommend talking to the police - they have teams specialised in domestic abuse and will recognise the behaviour. I spoke to a police officer after DS came home with a bruise on his arm after a weekend with exH. ExH had pinched him. Minor in the scheme of things but worrrying given exH’s history. I logged it with the police (this was only October last year, so nearly 2 years after we split) and the police officer I spoke to was amazing, so reassuring and validating - I wished I’d gone to the police earlier but I was worried about losing control of the process and some decisions being taken out of my hands.

You DON'T!!

Telling him this is likely to put you in danger, so don't even consider it! You can tell your solicitor that you have recordings, and they will advise you from there.

Please go, go safely, but go. Ultimately he needs you to be within reach to control you. Get away and you can begin to heal.

Not a word about the recordings.
Keep that information for when it might be useful.
But let the police know you are fleeing incase he calls them and reports you and the children gone.

Get out and tell him when you are gone that you have left.
Ask Women's aid for best advice.

Keep repeating to everyone one he was abusing you and the children and abusing you in front of the children.
The children are afraid of him.

You are doing this for your children.
Don't listen to your mother.

I wouldn't tell him you have any recordings at all.

I would tell your legal advisor. He might well try to twist things and say you've been spying or are bonkers or whatever bullshit he's likely to come out with, but once you are out./he is out, and the kids are with you... it doesn't matter so much.

Don't give him the time to stew on it and work it around in his mind!

Id tell him to fuck off... but have a back up plan to leave if he will not. Find out where you stand re selling the house/getting him out etc if he wont leave.

So some bags packed for the kids, ideally kids somewhere else, tell him to leave and if he won't sling his hook, get in the car and go to somewhere previously checked out and suitable, when you've a few days leave in hand to get things sorted.

Don’t blame yourself. I did but I’ve learned it’s partly because we grew up where it was normalised. Plus every relationship has blips and no one is perfect, right? We make allowances we shouldn’t but they are skilled manipulators, who know when to be nice again so we soon forget.
it’s the boiling frog thing. Put the frog straight in hot water, it jumps straight out. Put it in cold then turn up the heat slowly and by the time it feels the danger, it’s too late.

Yes. You've done the preparation. It's time. You don't want to be here in 5 years with your boys deriding you every day when you come home. We're all rooting for you and ready to support you on here.

Just remember your posts about how this utterly mediocre and inadequate man kept accusing you of 'fucking things up' and how he was so angry with you in front of the children that they ran under the table to hide.

You've done all the practical things to enable you and the children to leave. If you are scared that his reaction to you telling him that you want to leave will be abusive in some way, particularly involving your children, please speak to Women's Aid or Right of Women.

You're ready, you WANT to do it, so please don't prolong the agony any longer OP. You CAN do this! Just take a deep breath and tell him, or if you don't want to face him, do as you have been advised, ie, ring 101 and tell them what you're doing, so that he doesn't report you as missing, and leave. We're almost half way through January now, you've put it off long enough. Time to pull the plug! We're all here for you. Please let us know that you're safe once you've done it. Sending you COURAGE and a sisterly hug.

I still have nightmares about those electric gates. In the car trying to get through before he shuts them on me..like a video clip on a loop. I never reach the gates, they are always closing but I never find out if I make it through lol

And I agree with Goldcushions2

He sounds well up the narcissist spectrum. Mine was. I had to leave when he was out. When I went back to try again…yeah I know , I still wear the Stupid sign…. I had to leave again while he was out because of the whining and snotters, and the we need to talk about this, just stay another day because I need help with x ..that went on for over a week . He wouldn’t go out unless I promised to be still there when he came back. Anyway , one afternoon, he was going out to a meeting. I’d tried to leave that morning and the usual tears and snotters from him, so I made the promise. Then when he’d gone I decided, I was going. Once out the electric gates, I texted him, said I was going as I’d said in the morning and switched the phone off. I’ve never been back. Met him once in a park to discuss the divorce.

He won’t want you to leave, and he won’t go, if you tell him to. Best you slip away when he’s out somewhere for a couple hours.

I do think you should log with 101 your house and number.
He is not a stable man.
I really think leaving might be safest.
I think ringing 101 and telling them that you are fleeing abuse would be best.
Men like him are quick to report to police that women fleeing them are "missing".
Being told by police they are "aware" can be very very sobering for them.
Bullies hate being exposed.

I think this is spot on!

It really does seem like most of his interactions with your children are actually a device for him to hurt, belittle and upset you.

Once you are not there when he is looking after them, two things are likely to happen:

1/He behaves better towards them as there is no scope to get a rise out of you
2/He washes his hands of looking after them because it is too hard, and so he doesn't seek 50/50 at all and actually has them as little as possible.

You may be poorer financially yes, but happier for sure. It won’t be nice for your children swing you being abused like this.

I rather live in a bedsit and be happy than live in a castle with a toxic partner.

You can do it, I've been following your posts for a while. Would it be useful to talk through your plan here?

Most banks now have a protocol for financial abuse, coercive control and domestic abuse.

If you ask for the department that deals with coercive control of mortgage customers within domestic abuse, I would imagine they have specific staff trained to deal with it.

He forces you to pay for everything.
He refuses to paybfor his children.
Gather proof.
Explain you would like a morgage holiday so you can rent another house to flee this awful man who is also abusing your children.
Tell them the morgage holiday is until the house is sold.
Spell it out.
You can do this.

@Ginge88 I think recordings of him to you are helpful. My exH was also not abusive to the kids but didn’t care if they saw him being awful to me. Exposing kids to that behaviour is psychological abuse.